Theories+of+Development

(by Melissa Blacksmith, Meghann Centeno, and Latoya Johnson)



 * Theories of Child Development ... **

To begin, development refers to how people grow, adapt, and change over their lifetime, through physical development, personality development, socioemotional development, cognitive development (thinking), and language development. Furthermore, it includes the gradual accumulation of knowledge versus stage-like development, or the extent to which children are born with innate mental structures versus learning through experience.

Often, people think of children as miniature adults, however this assumption is incorrect. Children see the world differently, they think differently, and they live by different moral and ethical principles than most adults do.

Over the years, many different theories of development have been constructed and discussed by psychologists, theorists, and researchers. These theories discuss a variety of developmental concerns, such as cognitive development, moral development, personal development, and social development. Of those psychologists, theorists, and researchers, the focus is on Jean Piaget, Lev Vygotsky, Erik Erickson, and Lawrence Kohlberg, who concerned themselves with the different aspects of development. Each of them share the belief that distinct stages of development can be identified and described, yet each of them also differ in the number of stages and the aspect of development (i.e. cognitive, social, moral, socioemotional, etc.).


 * Major Theories of Child Development ... **

//**Jean Piaget's **//theories of cognitive and moral development


 * //Lev Vygotsky's//** theory of cognitive development [[image:http://webpages.charter.net/schmolze1/vygotsky/vyg15.jpg width="154" height="241"]]


 * //Erik Erikson's//** theory of personal and social development
 * //Lawrence Kohlberg's//** theory of moral development [[image:http://relong.myweb.uga.edu/index_files/image002.jpg width="196" height="268"]]